u/_ChickenTenders_

I’m going to keep this short (this did not end up being short), but around a few months ago I went through a very messy breakup with my qpp of 6 months. It was horrible. It was my first ever relationship, and my qpp was extremely manipulative, lied about everything, and emotionally abused me. But I stayed because I loved her. And then she left.

During the relationship she would always exaggerate things to hurt me more and never even cared when I bring up when I was hurt by her. The ways that I was treated in that relationship are things I cannot see in any way other than to harm me for the fun of it. Every time I’d bring up an insecurity of mine, she’d find a way to remind me of it or make me feel bad for it. “I feel too childish” and she gives me a cute stuffed animal and guilt trips me about how she’s wasting money on me while she’s poor (I told her not to spend money on me) or when I told her I was really uncomfortable hearing or seeing anything sexual, and she shows me very detailed drawings of genitals. She lied about everything. Lied about sharing interests, making up completely fake details about her life, stuff like that. But she would always reveal the truth to me later on when she knew it would hurt me more.

(Next paragraph covers depression, self harm, and suicide. If you don’t like hearing about that I’ve made sure the rest of this makes sense even if you skip this one)

During the relationship she pushed me well past my breaking point, after a while I was self harming every time I’d make a mistake and make her upset, but she’d always lie about being upset so that I’d feel bad. She emotionally abused me to the point where I could barely handle talking to anyone anymore for a few weeks. I was extremely depressed because of her. I was losing control of my own emotions and feelings. She hurt me in ways I can barely even describe. I was so scared of her and so stressed that I would say things to her that I didn’t mean to say, I didn’t know how to handle any of what I was feeling. She would use these things I’d say when I was panicking as more things to use against me. After a while, it all made me extremely suicidal. She always asked how I felt, and would act mad when I didn’t tell her everything I felt, then she’d be even more mad when I told the truth. I almost acted on my thoughts many times because of her.

Then she broke up with me on the day it was at its worst. She waited until she hurt me to the point where I couldn’t be hurt any more than I already was. And she continued to lie. First pretending to still be close friends, playing with my feelings by telling me she’d come back one day and that she still “loved me”, and she continued to reveal more about herself that she lied about to continue hurting me.

I’ve been deeply hurt by this whole experience. It seems like she’s finally decided to leave my life, but when she had finally decided to give up on hurting me more, she told me she was willing to spread rumors about me. She said she’d tell everyone I ever cared about “what I did”, but only saying the things she did. She hasn’t done this yet, but she’s unfortunately in my main friend group, so I’m worrying about this a lot. She could ruin my life whenever she wanted. I told myself I wouldn’t tell anyone what she did to me, hoping that it would prevent her from retaliating with her fake rumors. She’s very persuasive with things, so I can pretty much guarantee it would be pretty easy for her to succeed in spreading a rumor like that amongst my friends.

I need to tell somebody. I need to tell my best friend. I know he’ll believe me, at least, I hope. I’ve been planning to tell him all that happened. How she treated me, what she’s said, how I feel, and what she might do. I’m going to warn him about the rumors that she might spread, and hope that he’s willing to stick by me to help make sure nobody believes them if she ever starts to spread these lies.

I’ve been emotionally preparing myself to have this conversation with my friend, but something else has been happening in my mind too. I think about him a LOT. And I think about him in ways I thought when I had first had a squish on my ex. I think I have a squish on my best friend. I don’t know if I’m ready to tell him, or if I ever will. I don’t know if I even want to try any kind of relationship ever again. I’m scared this will happen again just like my first qpr. But I think I love him. A lot. I feel like I want to tell him that I feel this way, but I also feel like I might not be ready, or might even regret confessing.

I’m stuck. I know I want to explain the situation with my ex, but I just can’t stop thinking about how much I care about my friend. I don’t know what to do. If anyone has advice, please let me know.

I’ll keep this mostly simple, I’ve got some weird feelings right now. I was born male, and have always used he/him pronouns. I don’t necessarily feel uncomfortable with my identity, but I feel like some things (such as the way I dress or look sometimes) feel too masculine, and some things people say to me (like calling me “sir” or some other super manly word) feel off.

Using they/them pronouns appeals to me, but I also still sort of like he/him pronouns at the same time? I don’t know exactly how to explain how I feel, and I know for sure I want to present myself as more gender neutral / androgynous with my style. I’m pretty new to non-binary stuff, but I know there’s lots of umbrella labels, so I’m curious to see if anyone else thinks I might fall under one of these.

Again, just to summarize, I usually like he/him pronouns, but more gender specific words (mainly more mature manly sounding ones) feel weird, and they/them pronouns or gender neutral words to describe me appeal just as much. I want both can I be just a lil guy that uses he/him but also use they/them? And if so, is there some sort of umbrella label for that?

I’ll keep things short here, my girlfriend is not the most mentally well person. She’s been struggling her whole life. She always says things like “I don’t know what I am anymore” or “I can’t do this for much longer” and it’s very scary. She almost commit suicide a few weeks ago, she said she doesn’t want to anymore, but she’s still saying things that seem really concerning… I’m doing my best to understand how she feels, but she’s a really complicated person and even she doesn’t understand how she feels. She also doesn’t seem to be good at getting help (and told me many times that she doesn’t WANT help)

What am I supposed to do here? I can’t lose her… How do I help her? What do I do.